


& if the night comes ( & the night will come )

by motherofangst



Category: Steven Universe (Cartoon)
Genre: F/M, Feels with no plot., First Time, Lars is back on earth, Trans Lars (Steven Universe), almost nsfw not not actually because it doesn't actually get ~~~there, free form, i dont know how tags work so im rambling thanks, lars is trans, let them reunite ., soft babes. i love them., there's not much of a plot to this. but i can't say its PWP bc there's no porn., there. that's what it is., trans coming out talk.
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-09-05
Updated: 2018-09-05
Packaged: 2019-07-07 06:30:44
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,526
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15902763
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/motherofangst/pseuds/motherofangst
Summary: He feels her still, and his eyes screw themselves shut between them, as if he could erase the admission and go back to everything before. He can’t hear himself breathe ; can’t hear her breathe. And he can’t tell if it’s because they’re both holding their breath, or if the anxiety rising high in his lungs was causing a static deafness.After Lars returns back to Earth, him and Sadie have a moment to themselves in his bedroom; and Lars thinks everything is ruined when Sadie wants to take it further and he has to explain a part of himself that he's kept close to his chest.





	& if the night comes ( & the night will come )

**Author's Note:**

> This is my first Steven Universe fic -- to try and get an idea out that I've had bouncing around my head.
> 
> This is unbeta'd. If you see any mistakes, please let me know and I'll fix them.
> 
> If I misrepresented anything in any way -- please let me know so that I can remedy it.
> 
> Title taken from the song _In Our Bedroom After The War_ by Stars.

Her skin was  _ warm,  _ a welcome distraction from the chill of his own flesh -- and the  _ chill  _ of the endless vacuum of space that he had almost had to come to  _ accept  _ as  _ home.  _ He could almost swear that his heart was racing quickly enough to almost be pounding at the  _ speed  _ of a rate that was closer to  _ fully alive  _ than the  _ half dead  _ that his blood pulsed through each and every vein of his body.  _ God,  _ he had missed her; even if he was be hard pressed to have admitted such -- it was  _ easier  _ to do so when her soft skin was under his pink digits ; sliding and slipping down her arms as those same arms wound around his neck. 

With how responsive she was being to him, he couldn’t help but press enough against her that her warmth was flush against his own chest -- a flurry of touch and sound that overwhelmed to a point that it was almost impossible to discern where she started and he ended, and it was because of this that he scarcely noticed when her hands moved from his neck to slip up his shirt.

When he brushed away her hands so that he could tug it over his head, her eyes fixated themselves on a secondary scar that usually hid itself under his shirt ; a fine pink fuchsia that matched the hue of the one over his eye, an almost  _ neat  _ line that adorned his chest -- and her fingers traced the line of it, causing him to shiver and his eyes to close for a moment as he caught the choked breath that rattled his lungs.

“ _ Sadie- _ ” he whispers, one hand moving to curl his fingers around her hand that had found a home over the soft, slower pulse of his heart against his chest; trying to find her confused and concerned gaze as he gave her hand a squeeze. 

She sits like that for a moment, her eyes on his own as if she was searching his gaze for something deeper that neither could communicate through audible words. ( Lars was never good at those  _ anyway --...  _ ) The concern softens into something different, as if she was reminding herself to be  _ thankful  _ that there was a heartbeat under her hand in the first place -- slow as it was.

She’s kissing him again, and once again -- he was forgetting his troubles and his worries. The unknowns that resided within  _ what he was,  _ what had become of him since Steven had brought him back. Homeworld no longer mattered in that moment,  _ nothing  _ else mattered in that moment but her -- because this wasn’t the island. This was something pure -- this was something real, with no false pretenses between them, one hand still wrapped around hers as if a lifeline -- an anchor -- and his other threading into locks of blonde hair as eyes closed to lose himself more so in the moment.

There was a spike of heat -- warmth against his form that he was unused to now with his state -- up his neck, one of her hands wandering to the expanse of his waistline. And his breath hitches -- she swallows it, but he’s pulling away regardless. His words harbors a different meaning when he echoes her name -- something closer to caution, sadness, concern, “...  _ Sadie.”  _

That confusion returns to her eyes -- and there is a hurt alongside it when he nudges her hand away from his jeans. “What did I--” she’s starting, her voice cracking with something she seemed to try and be concealing, warring with herself between  _ hurt  _ and  _ anger  _ that Lars might be  _ stringing  _ her along all over again.

He’s swallowing thickly enough for it to hurt, shaking his head to try and bide his time while he attempts to string a thought together. Through his time with the Off Colors, he had learned a sense of  _ bravery  _ that he had previously locked; able to face down the likes of  _ Emerald  _ without even blinking an eye --- so what had changed? What had regressed?

“-- no,” he murmurs, trying to give her hand another reassuring squeeze -- but out of fear of being hurt further, her hand is slowly sliding out of his. And that causes the fear in his chest to rise further until it’s nearly choking him. “ _ No,”  _ he repeats thickly, an aborted attempt at reaching for her hand once more causing his hand to hang uselessly between them -- “It’s not -- … There’s something I’ve not told you, Sadie --” His tongue feels heavy in his mouth as he lets the admission out, feeling like stone against the bottom of his jaw.

He’s unable to read her eyes, and it aches -- so he looks away, but she doesn’t. He can feel her eyes on him, and it’s burning with every second that rolls by. She waits in silence, moments that drag on as she expects  _ an explanation.  _ A nasty purgatory as they hung in oblivion -- Lars waiting for the other shoe to drop with an admission, a secret that he had clung so close to his chest that it felt like a  _ self preservation  _ to never let it leave his lips.

Part of him wanted to once more create a chasm between them -- to push her away until there was more space between them to make it easier for him to breathe.  _ Before --  _ he would’ve done so. But now ….? Where was the facade of the strong Captain that had lead the Off Colors to the safety of Earth?

“I’m not --” No, that sounds wrong. He chastises himself with another sharp shake of his head, finally and reluctantly bringing his eyes back up hers ; as if pleading with her to understand him.

She still looks hurt, but it does warm a little when she realizes that he’s  _ genuine --  _ that he’s afraid,  _ truly afraid,  _ and it makes her seem to ache in a very different way. “Lars?”

He swallows compulsively, jawline tightening and he’s tearing his eyes away from her. Because he can’t look at her when he tells her; because he can feel everything between them severing before he even admits it. He wants to defend himself, but -- he knows that  _ he doesn’t need to.  _ His choices, and the way that he feels, are his alone. He can hear his mother telling him that in the back of his head -- but it doesn’t erase the fear. “Sadie-” he starts, and he can hear her breath catch around her name in the air in anticipation. “I’m … -- I’m not ….-” There it was again.  _ I’m not --  _ No, that’s not right; he was already telling himself that the wording  _ wasn’t right --  _ he shouldn’t have to  _ defend anything.  _ The negative connotation was something he had pushed into his past. So -- he says it fast enough to feel like he was prying a dislocated joint back into place, “I’m trans.”

He feels her still, and his eyes screw themselves shut between them, as if he could erase the admission and go back to everything before. He can’t hear himself breathe ; can’t hear her breathe. And he can’t tell if it’s because they’re both holding their breath, or if the anxiety rising high in his lungs was causing a static deafness.

That’s all that he can focus on, and the pain of the anticipation of rejection in his chest, before the feel of  _ oh --  _ her warm hands against his face, against his jawline and soothing the beginnings of tear tracks he hadn’t even realized was present.

He dares himself to open his eyes, to look up at her through his lashes. And what he saw was not what he expected to see. She was smiling, and it was  _ soft --  _ and, oh, that was such a beautiful look on her features. He wished that he could bottle it to put it in a small box to tuck into the darkest corners of his mind with a little bow to pull back out on nights he needed it the most to brighten those dark corners. He opens his mouth to speak, but nothing comes out -- words stolen with the weight of the admission on his chest.

It’s her turn to shake her head, smiling softly still at him as her thumbs trace circles on his cheeks, “Oh, Lars -” she tells him, something unfamiliar in her tone. “ _ It doesn’t matter --  _ it doesn’t change anything.  _ I wish you would’ve told me sooner,  _ so I could have avoided you being  _ so afraid  _ of telling me -- you never should be afraid to tell me anything.  _ Hell --  _ if I still want you past you  _ turning pink _ _ ,  _ what makes you think anything else you tell me would change anything? You're my best friend -- I ... don't know, probably --- definitely _more_ than that.”

There’s something warm and heavy in his heart that makes it feel like it might just burst through his ribcage ; and he’s grinning. The tears on his cheeks are no longer from fear, but from something entirely different. He cannot find the words to respond to her -- so he doesn’t. Instead a hand returns to the back of her neck and tugs her down gently, letting her steal his breath all over again as he drinks her in.

**Author's Note:**

> Find me on tumblr, same username.


End file.
